Doing a bit of family tree. I have Fred Parrott, son of Fred Parrott, and Ernie Parrott, son of Ernie Parrott. Different parents, same grandparents. Then we have brother Major Parrott who married a Frankie. The there is Frank Parrott, son of Frank Parrott, son of Frank Parrott, and a Frank Parrott son of George Parrott, and a Dick Parrott, son of Harry Parrott and all three have different parents but the same grandparents – but (obviously)(partially) different from Fred and Ernie’s. It turns out that the middle Frank, has a brother-in-law called Frank Collier. He also has a nephew called James Parrott, and a brother called James Parrott, and a brother-in-law called James Collier. This James Collier is the son of James Collier who married first Ann Astbury, and then Alice Mary Astbury. James Collier Jr married a different Alice Mary. Their son Sid only had three grandparents as James and Alice were half first cousins. One of these was my 4th great aunt, Martha Barnes, since you ask. And they were all farmers in C19 Staffordshire.
Update (Jan 2020): Even better – one of the Parrots could fly. Third cousin x2 James Edward Parrott got his Royal Aero cert in 1948 in a Miles Hawk at Wolverhampton Aero Club. Here’s one I snapped last summer (a Hawk, not a Parrott).
Plodding through my family history research today, I found a new cousin, Frederick Peckham, who was apparently master of the SS Umona.
During WWII, 36,749 Merchant Navy seamen and women were lost to enemy action, 5,720 were taken prisoner and 4,707 were wounded, totalling 47,176 casualties, a minimum casualty rate of over 25 percent.
SS Umona (Library of Contemporary History, Stuttgart via uboat.net)
Finally got something to boast about on the family tree. My grandad’s 3rd cousin, the composer Harold Box, gave this to the world.
Fred Heatherton is credited as composer – that’s a songwriting pseudonym for a collaboration of English songwriters Harold Elton Box (1903–1981) and Desmond Cox (1903–1966). The song was published by Box and Cox Publications.
Now (Dec 2022) fully imported from my 2020 lockdown Blogger site, converted from posts to pages, and with the contemporary Facebook highlight posts added here as posts.
Now, in a second phase, I’m restructuring to layer in more research without losing coherence, e.g. by separating out the tree summaries to give a thread all the way through from the 32 initial families, and to fold in another generation in summary to the structure. This means that I’m rewriting Chapter V in the same format as Chapters I – IV. The information is presently in the ‘families of…’ pages, formerly family directories.
The Tree itself is currently kept at Ancestry.com; the Living Tree is also available in a private group on Facebook. Let me know if you want access or info.
Almighty God, by whose mercy I am permitted to behold the beginning of another year, bless me with thy help and favour. Mitigate, if it shall seem best unto thee, the diseases of my body, and calm the disorders of my mind. Dispel my terrors, and grant that the time which thou shalt yet allow me, may not pass unprofitably away. Let not pleasure seduce me, idleness lull me, or misery depress me.
Samuel Johnson
Happy New Year those who are following… I thought I’d be done by now but there are still a few gaps on Mum’s side, including that metal-bashing story I left hanging last month. But first… I was the first Wheaver born out of the Birmingham orbit since its industrialisation. Lichfield, Staffordshire, is a whole 8 miles due north of Sutton (centre of the universe) and 30 miles due east of Dawley, home of the Lamberts and Captain Webb.
The Close, LichfieldBore St, Lichfield
It wasn’t known at the time that our Barnes ancestors (after whom some of us are still being named) were rooted in the Stafford area. They had been prosperous but this was a period of agricultural depression. Our Charles may have eloped into Peaky Blinder country: the 180-acre family farm was inherited by his younger brother. He kept his dignity (a farmer’s bailiff and a gentleman) but sold the farm (pic).
Tixall Farm Entrance
Another brother was jailed for forging a receipt, took over the Goat pub in Liverpool, and went bankrupt. Another worked up to being a miller in his own right but ended up administering poor relief. A sister married a conductor on the Grand Junction Railway who became a tea dealer, and then died of pulmonary consumption at age 36. Charles’ sister, Mary, married a farmer whose farm size halved between 1871 and 1881 and disappeared by 1891.
Mary’s daughter was widowed young and became a barmaid at the Smithfield Hotel, Lichfield (built for the railway in 1848 – pic). She married the owner and took over the hotel when she was widowed again. The hotel was built over by Tesco in 2007.
Smithfield Hotel, Lichfield
Her son, Samuel Heath (pic), was a grocer’s traveller who became Sheriff of Lichfield and married the daughter of the Lichfield Brewing Company.
Samuel Heath
The brewer gave the land which allowed the workhouse to expand with the Victoria Cottage Hospital (pic), and later the maternity ward.
Probable Victoria Cottage Hospital, Sandford St, Lichfield (Lichfield Lore)
I just missed being born in that ward, it having moved a stone’s throw away five years earlier. The new hospital (pic) was also knocked down in 2007.
Victoria Hospital, Lichfield
Lichfield was also birthplace to the great lexicographer (and composer of New Year’s prayers), Sam Johnson (pic).
